Trump making '180-degree surrender' by dropping investigation: analysis

Late Friday morning, April 24, journalists ranging from ABC News' Katherine Faulders to MS NOW's Ana Cabrera reported that the Donald Trump-era U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has decided to drop its criminal investigation of U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell.Cabrera brought on MS NOW's Ken Dilanian for analysis of the breaking news, and he emphasized that federal prosecutor Jeanine Pirro — the former Fox News host who was handling the probe at DOJ — has "surrendered" in a big way.When Cabrera asked Dilanian "how big a shift" this was "for the DOJ," he responded, "It's a 180-degree surrender, essentially, by the U.S. attorney in Washington, Jeanine Pirro."The MS NOW criminal justice/national security reporter told Cabrera, "What's really interesting to me about this is that she's sort of suggesting that she's turning this case over to the inspector general at the Federal Reserve. But the fact is, the inspector general has been examining this project for some time. Jerome Powell asked the inspector general to take a look back in July of last year…. From what I understand from my reporting, the inspector general has found no evidence of criminal wrongdoing."Critics of Trump and Pirro attacked the Powell probe as frivolous and politically motivated, noting Trump's anger at the Fed chairman for refusing to lower interest rates as much as he would like. And conservative Sen. Thom Tillis (R-North Carolina) said he would oppose Trump's nominee to replace Powell, Kevin Warsh, unless the case were dropped.Dilanian told Cabrera, "What Jeanine Pirro is essentially conceding here is that there's no criminal case. There never was. In fact, one of her prosecutors told a judge, in open court, that they were aware of no criminal wrongdoing by Jerome Powell, the chairman of the Federal Reserve. This was entirely a product of Donald Trump's imagination." - YouTube www.youtube.com